The short explanation is that Mathematica has two modes of entry -- a
"text" mode and a "math" mode. The text mode formats things as a word
processor would. Math mode, on the other hand, wants to fiddle with the
spacing and the visual styles to be appropriate for math. You can embed
one in another, and when you do and you're editing in the embedded mode,
you see the beige background you describe.
I'm just going to give you a recipe for doing what you want. Ideally,
the steps of this recipe would be condensed and on the Classroom Assistant
palette, but they're not (I'll follow up internally on this, and we'll
consider a few modifications for a future version).
* Click some place between cells, so that you have the long horizontal
line which serves as the cell insertion point. * Click the 1x2 palette
button that you did before. * Choose the menu item Cell->Convert
To->TraditionalForm Display. * Select the first placeholder in the
grid again and choose Insert->Typesetting->New Inline Cell (Ctrl+9). *
The cell is still an input cell and will be bold. To get rid of that,
select the cell bracket and choose Format->Style->Text (Cmd+7).
Or, somewhat easier, evaluate this code to make a button, click on a
cell insertion point, and click the button:
Button["Insert Text+Math Grid",
NotebookWrite[InputNotebook[],
Cell[BoxData[
FormBox[GridBox[{{Cell["text"], "\[Placeholder]"}}],
TraditionalForm]], "Text"]]]
You could turn this button into a palette (Palettes->Generate Palette
from Selection) and install it (Palettes->Install Palette...) and use
it later (Palettes-><whatever you named your palette>) as well.
Note that with this solution, you'll still get beige when editing
your text, but only around the text, and it'll go away if you click
anyplace else. You will not get beige on the right-hand element if you,
for example, copy and paste a graphic into it.
Sincerely,
John Fultz
jfultz at wolfram.com
User Interface Group
Wolfram Research, Inc.
On Wed, 10 Jun 2009 20:35:56 -0400 (EDT), Adam Weyhaupt wrote:
> I trying to create a presentation (slide show) using Mathematica
> 7.0.1 on Mac OS X 10.4.11 for the first time.
>
> I am using the default stylesheet. On the first slide, I inserted a
> 1x2 grid (using the "classroom assistant" palette). On the left hand
> side of the grid I typed some text. When I do so, the background of
> the grid turns beige. On the right hand side of the grid I copied
> and pasted a 3D rotatable graphic (a cube obtained from PolyhedronData
> ["Cube"]). Again, the background is beige. When I click somewhere
> else not on the grid, the background turns white. Then, when I view
> the slide in slideshow mode, the grid background is white. However,
> if I rotate the graphic, the background of the grid becomes beige,
> and I am unable to return it to white by clicking off the grid.
> Clicking somewhere else returns only the text side to white but not
> the graphic side.
>
> The result is a poor looking presentation. Do any of you have any
> suggestions for avoiding this behavior? Is there a preferred method
> for placing text and graphics side by side?
>
> Thanks for your help,
>
> Adam